SYDNEY (Reuters) - A rain-bearing La Nina weather pattern,
which has begun to end years of serious drought in Australia,
was expected to remain until the middle of 2008, the weather
bureau said on Thursday.

Australia's parched farm sector welcomed the forecast,
although weather officials warned that La Nina also brought the
risk of more floods and cyclones.

"There's a higher-than-normal chance of that happening when
you're in a La Nina," Brad Murphy, senior climatologist at the
National Climate Centre, told Reuters.

"That's always a risk. You never get just the right amount
of rainfall everywhere. You either get too much or not enough."

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Weather officials have already warned that La Nina, which
results from warmer-than-normal sea surface temperatures around
Australia's northeast, could make 2008 a 30-year peak cyclone
season.

Australia's northeastern coast has already been battered by
cyclonic winds and flooding in December and January, creating
havoc for holidaymakers and country towns.

This week Cyclone Gene hit Fiji's main island of Viti Levu,
3,500 km (2,200 miles) east of Australia, causing flooding,
killing at least six people and shutting down business.

On Thursday, the storm was heading toward Vanuatu and New
Caledonia, between Fiji and the Australian coast. Both island
nations were on official alert.

La Nina was likely to persist at least until late in the
southern hemisphere autumn, the Australian Bureau of
Meteorology said on Thursday.

"Climate models point to continued moderate La Nina
conditions until the middle of 2008," it said.

Parts of eastern Australia have already been hit with
severe flooding in December and January. The area is emerging
from the worst drought in a century, devastating crops in three
of the past six years.

But Australia's key winter grains crops will need rain in
April, in the planting season, and in subsequent months, if the
country is to produce bumper crops to compensate for losses in
recent years.

La Nina weather conditions are the reverse of the El Nino
weather pattern, which triggered severe drought across large
areas of Australia. El Nino is a warming of ocean temperatures
in the western Pacific off South America, triggering a global
disruption of weather patterns.

It brings drought to Australia and parts of Southeast Asia
and floods to parts of South and North America.

Remnants of the drought still persist, although hopes are
high that the present La Nina will eventually bring an official
declaration of an end of the drought.